Video Format Brings Out Creativity In Speech Students

Video Format Brings Out Creativity In Speech Students

Students in Maya Kehr Yoder’s Speech class had a watch party last week to view and share feedback on each other’s informative speeches. This speech assignment, created by former English instructor Mary Forney, asks students to teach others how to do something. The catch? The speechmakers are supposed to give really terrible advice and present it as if it were great advice. This format allows for lots of creativity and humor. Two main goals for this assignment were to practice giving a speech in an extemporaneous format and to incorporate different building blocks of speech (statistics, quotations, analogies, demonstrations, reference to audience, etc.).

Although giving speeches during quarantine is naturally different than presenting live speeches, the filmed format did allow for some creative twists to the assignment. “Because the speeches were filmed, students were able to demonstrate with actual tractors, trailers, cats, and flames (for the flambe speech. It was fun to see how they adapted,” said Kehr Yoder. Kehr Yoder added that she was “impressed by the effort and energy students took to attempt this new format.” #hillcrestunited